We like the functionality of the Box/Jive integration but we have difficulty with the Box charging structure. Let me explain:

We want all our Jive users to access content stored on Box through the Jive platform (according to permissions we administer) but most will be very light users, from a data perspective, and only a small handful will need to access the content directly through Box.

The Box integration maps each JIve user to a "managed user" on Box... and Box charges on a per "managed user" basis. As a result the service is not economic as we get charged for a level of service disproportionate to our needs.

Yes, Box could be more accommodating but does anyone have experience of a Box integration where all Jive users had access via Jive but the number of managed users was reduced?

Thanks for raising this question around Box integration user accounts. I understand that only a single Box integration user is required for Jive side access, as per our documentation. For reference, I'm going to quote our Jive 8 documentation:

If you want to be able to manage your uploaded files via Box.com instead of Jive, you can set up a place-level connection to synchronize files as well as comments about the files from both sides.

To integrate selected Jive places with Box as the external file storage provider, and to socialize the documents you store in your Box folders, you can connect a Box account to a Jive community. The initial relationship is created when you connect a Box admin account to your community. A Box Integration user with rights to this account is created in Jive. When community users and administrators create places, a folder within the Box account is created and identified with the name of the place. Files added to or modified in that folder from either the Box side or the Jive side are then synchronized. When a Jive user uploads a file to the group, the file is posted to the Box group using the Box Integration user.

This means Jive users don't need Box accounts to access the information in places to which they have rights. They can access and modify any files posted there from the Jive side. However, they won't have access to the contents of the folder from the Box side unless they also have a Box account. Box users who have access to the folder will also need a Jive account if they want to add more documents to the Jive-linked Box folder or modify its contents. Users can comment on documents from either side, and their comments will be visible from both Box and Jive.

Thanks for responding on this Jeph... really appreciated. I've been examining the process that creates 'managed users' on the Box side of things.

Yes, there are two options when setting up the integration: a) enable all users so they can create groups that use Box; or b) use Jive permission groups to manage this.

You say that under the second option, there should be only one Box side user - the 'Box Integration User' - but I'm not sure whether that is correct. Jive users are automatically mapped to Box according to the settings in "Mapping Options" (found under Add Ons / Storage Management)... the recommended default is to map users by their email address. Does this not happen whether the user is authenticated by option a) or b)?

Currently I have the system set up using option a) but I'd like to test this by deleting the users that Box has created and changing the settings to option b)... to see whether Box recreates these managed users as they access relevant content. My concern is that we have a large number of files on Box already, in a complex folder structure, and I don't know what the ramification will be of the switch over. Will the change in permissions change seamlessly?

Can you provide any further guidance? Are you confident that using Jive permission groups will mean that Box only requires one user account?